


The Blackest of Rooms

by fictionalcandie



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-05
Updated: 2010-12-05
Packaged: 2017-12-14 00:41:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/830709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictionalcandie/pseuds/fictionalcandie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>They get Sam's soul back at 3 AM on a Wednesday.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Blackest of Rooms

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on 5 December 2010. AU post-Season Six, Episode Ten.

They get Sam's soul back at 3 AM on a Wednesday.

Dean had to tie Sam to a chair to get him still long enough, and Sam's been alternately yelling at him and trying to talk him out of it for the last hour and a half, but after—

God.

After, Sam starts screaming.

And doesn't stop.

It's full-on crazy, writhing-in-agony screaming, wordless eardrum-shattering noise just ripping out of Sam's throat, and while he was struggling against the ropes before, now he's thrashing around desperately, no method to it at all, his eyes rolling wildly in his skull.

At first Dean thinks it hasn't worked. Thinks that he's messed up, somehow. But he asks Cas to check, and Cas swears that yeah, Sam's soul is back — and it's terrifying that there's not a noticeable change in Sam's screaming while Cas finds this out — and, hey, turns out, the damage is as bad as they were afraid it might be.

"Worse, actually," Cas says quietly. He's pale, unnaturally so, especially for Cas who doesn't _get_ pale, and he has been since he pulled his hand back out of Sam's gut. "It's... much worse."

In his chair, Sam keeps screaming.

"Can you do anything? Help him?" Dean demands, his teeth gritted because he's been inuring himself to not-Sam wearing Sam's skin and using Sam's voice, and he's gotten pretty good at not reacting to the things that would, if done by the real Sam, send Dean into total kill-everyone mode, but this is—

It's _Sam_.

Cas shakes his head.

The chair scrapes against the floor as Sam's thrashing knocks it over. Sam doesn't stop. Not even for a second.

"I told you, I wouldn't even know where to start," Cas says, quiet.

" _Fuck_ ," Dean growls.

Cas glances at Sam. Dean doesn't know exactly what he sees. Dean _can't_ look.

Cas lifts his hand toward Sam. He looks back at Dean, as if asking permission. "But I could..."

For a second, Dean has to clench his jaw tightly, or else he'd be screaming. Like Sam. He nods.

"Knock him out."

Cas touches his fingers to Sam's forehead. Sam's eyes roll back and he goes blessedly, mercifully quiet.

—

Dean hauls Sam to the Impala while he's still unconscious, gets him into the backseat.

Cas offers to help carry him. Dean says no.

Dean packs their things mechanically, loads the car.

Cas offers to help. Dean says no.

He gets behind the wheel, and there's only one place they could be heading at a time like this. Dean heads for Bobby's.

Cas offers to angel-port them. Dean says no.

—

Dean pulls up in Bobby's scrap yard at noon on a Thursday, the day after they get Sam's soul back.

Sam wakes up six times during the drive.

Every time, he screams like he’s being tortured.

Every time, Cas knocks him back out.

When they arrive, Bobby's waiting for them.

He moves to help Dean pull Sam out. Dean glares him off.

"Is he—" Bobby asks, while Dean struggles into the house under Sam's weight.

Cas shakes his head.

Bobby closes his mouth and doesn't ask again, just follows Dean and Sam.

—

By Sunday afternoon, Bobby has given up looking for a way to help Sam.

Dean's just plain given up.

He's sitting, head in his hands, in a chair next to the sofa where he put Sam, watching his brother lie unmoving in angel-enforced sleep.

He can hear Bobby and Cas talking in the kitchen.

"Should we...?" Bobby is asking, warily. He sounds worn down. _Old_.

"Yes, I think so," replies Cas. "Get it."

A few minutes later, Bobby is at Dean's side. He clears his throat. Dean doesn't bother looking up.

Suddenly, there's something dangling in the air in front of his face.

It takes Dean a moment to process what he's seeing, then he's recoiling as fast as he can, nearly knocking the chair over as he gets off of it and scrambles to his feet, backing away. "What the _hell_ , Bobby?"

Bobby keeps his arm extended, holding out the amulet Sam gave Dean when they were children, that Dean wore every second of his life for _decades_.

" _Bobby_ ," Dean repeats.

"Sam saved it," is all Bobby says.

After a few minutes, during which Dean doesn't move, he drops the amulet on Dean's chair and goes back to the kitchen.

It takes a very long time, but finally Dean scoops up the amulet, his hand shaking. He sinks back down onto the chair, and as his eyes fix on Sam again, his fingers curl around it hard enough that the metal digs into them in a way that would be painful if Dean could feel it.

His view of Sam swims and blurs as his eyes well up.

He doesn't blink to clear them.

—

In the middle of the night, when Bobby's finally given up trying to get Dean to eat and gone to bed, and Cas has disappeared to Dean-doesn't-know-or-care-where, Dean swallows thickly and starts to speak.

He says all the things to his brother that he's never, ever been able to say while Sam could hear him — how he loves Sam, how he was wrong and he's sorry, how maybe he should have listened (always), how he's never been perfect but he always thought if he tried hard (for Sam, always for Sam) maybe it would be enough, how much he's missed Sam the last two years even while Sam's body was _right there_ , how he wishes he could fix things (this, the past, the future, _everything_ ) for Sam, how he wishes that there was something _anything_ he could do, how he's _so goddamn sorry and he **loves Sam so goddamn much**_ — in a voice that gets lower and more uneven the longer he talks.

Then he moves closer to the couch, get down on his knees next to it. He drops his head to his brother's chest, starts to quake, and the tears fall.

He has no idea how long he stays that way, shaking and crying, bent over the unblemished wreck of his brother.

As the sky starts to lighten, Dean lifts his head. He wipes his face with the hand still holding the amulet, then shifts his grip so he's holding it by the leather cord.

"I know this won't make anything better," he whispers — and he doesn't even recognize the gravelly rasp of his own voice — as he lifts it toward Sam, "but, I can't— I want—"

He clears his throat, holds Sam up with his other hand as he slips the cord over Sam's head.

"You should have this, Sammy."

His eyes falling closed, Dean presses his lips, dry and cracked as they are, to Sam's forehead for a heartbeat.

Then he gets to his feet and leaves the room.

—

Bobby doesn't say anything when he finds Dean sitting in the kitchen, staring at nothing. He simply makes a pot of coffee, pours two cups, and slides one across the table to Dean.

Dean hasn't looked at his brother's body in more than two hours.

Sam should have woken again by now, should be screaming again. He isn't. Dean wonders if maybe he's dead.

Wonders if maybe that wouldn't be the kindest thing.

Can't stand it.

Dean _aches_.

Eventually, Bobby breaks the silence. "There might be something more," he says.

"There isn't," says Dean. He doesn't look up. "You and I both know there isn't, Bobby."

"There _migh_ —" Bobby starts. His words stop abruptly, with a strangled little yelp. His coffee cup bangs on the table as he sets it down too hard.

For the first time all morning, Dean actually _looks_ at Bobby, concerned.

Bobby is gaping at the archway into the living room.

The room where Sam's body is.

Dean turns in his chair so fast he nearly gives himself whiplash.

Sam is standing there, hand gripping at the front of his own t-shirt, his eyes on Dean. He looks haunted, desperate, broken, _ruined_.

He's not screaming.

Dean doesn't dare breathe.

Slowly, Sam licks his lips. He opens his mouth, his voice small and barely audible:

"... _Dean_?"

And then he starts to cry. Big fat sloppy tears rolling down his cheeks, snot pouring from his nose, his face screwing up and turning red, his whole body shaking like a leaf. He's huge and unsteady and ugly, a disaster in jeans and hunting boots.

He's a fucking mess.

He's _Sam_.

Dean doesn't even register moving before he's wrapped Sam up, pulling him close, arms a vise around him—

_Sam clings back_.

**Author's Note:**

> This work can also be read [on LiveJournal](http://gailsauce.livejournal.com/76724.html) or [on Dreamwidth](http://gailsauce.dreamwidth.org/76138.html?style=site).


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